Kohn angle it’s a weekly column about the challenges and opportunities of supporting American movie culture.
This week, lost in the chaos of the SAG-AFTRA strike and its impact on the fall movie season, Canadian investment studio BRON crossed the news cycle with a major update: They’re going bankrupt.
Last summer, I reported layoffs at the once-ambitious enterprise co-founded by Aaron and Brenda Gilbert in 2010, as the financier behind “Joker” and “Licorice Pizza” has tackled music: Filmmaking is not a growth business. While BRON made a late move to Web3 (remember NFTs… anyone?) the window of opportunity had passed. However, while BRON’s fate may have been inevitable, I found it noteworthy that the company tried to convey to the industry that it hadn’t abandoned its interest in film investments; he just wasn’t looking for projects that exceeded $10 million.
Related stories
The Barbenheimer Experience, Reviewed: Do These Movies Really Work as a Double Feature?
Greta Gerwig says she’s ‘terrified’ of directing ‘The Chronicles of Narnia’ films
This pivot came too late, but it was the right idea, and I’m reminded of it in the context of recent SAG waivers the union has granted to projects not affiliated with the AMPTP. While I’ve long argued that cinema benefits from a “less is more” mentality — films aren’t dying, they’re just getting smaller — the strike has created a unique opportunity for creatives in the film industry to better understand the sustainability of working outside the system.
Not a bad place to hang out for a spell. Time and time again I find that anyone who says it’s been a bad year for movies hasn’t seen enough of them. That’s because even in these content-dense times, the number of films produced by major US studios (aka the most powerful AMPTP signatories) represents only a fraction of cinematic activity at any given time. The best cinema, the work that often appears on the festival circuit, whether or not it finds its way to success in the American market, is made outside the system.
And if it’s good enough, it creeps in there anyway. This remains true. SAG said it will not hamper any non-AMPTP projects built with waivers that will ultimately ensure distribution with AMPTP members. You don’t have to make a Netflix movie to get some Netflix money at the end of the day.
Of course, that result might feel like adding fuel to the fire. Why should Netflix or any other studio feel compelled to negotiate when they can just wait for the final result and pony up? This question, however, misses the point. If studios can only do business with films made outside their control, they have an even better chance of getting out. Maybe… everyone wins?
Prominent players with SAG waivers are doing the right thing by going back to work. Whether it’s Anne Hathaway in David Lowery’s upcoming “Mother Mary,” which can now resume in Europe, or Matthew McConaughey in “The Rivals of Amziah King,” now filming in Alabama, these projects provide an important distinction between the targets of the strike (AMPTP members and the deals they make with talent) and the art itself, which doesn’t have to go underground just because the more commercial side of the industry has become unsustainable.
The strike is already causing untold devastation in the film world. The most fragile members of the sector are the freelancers, and artisans in particular, who have suffered immediate repercussions from losing their jobs. While reporting on the destabilization of the fall festival circuit earlier this week, I spoke to a producer who told me that “if it lasts until January, we won’t have an industry.” That may be true, but only in the precise terms that industry has dictated business.
Recent developments mean independently produced projects could play a bigger role in the content wars than ever before. Goodbye, bad Netflix romantic comedies and overpriced but forgettable Amazon action movies; hello, modestly priced (and probably much better) alternatives.
Strike conditions may also force established actors to accept better and riskier opportunities. Last April, when Jim Carrey announced his retirement following the release of “Sonic 2,” I lamented how so many A-listers have eluded more exciting directors in favor of bland studio tentacles. Sure, it can be nice to kick back on a pile of cash, but wealthy actors who thrive on some measure of creative accomplishment can be quite disappointed with the hit system’s options. Now more than ever, big stars can get a taste of the alternative and may not be disappointed with what they find.
None of this is to say that the strike is good for the filmmaking business. However, as anyone involved in that business knows, very few directing prospects have a guaranteed ROI unless the job has something to offer in the first place. As audiences gradually lose interest in the sea of homogeneity that comes with an overabundance of Marvel content and the like, the time is ripe for originality.
As usual, I welcome feedback in this column: eric@indiewire.com
Last week I wrote about the absence of a documentary union against the backdrop of the strikes. Here are some of the valuable feedback I’ve received.
“As someone who has worked off and on in the documentary space for 10 years as a writer, producer and researcher, I can’t tell you how much I enjoyed the article on the documentary space and unions/unionization. It’s a very strange time for us and I have shared the article with several colleagues. In addition to Jigsaw going WGA, I believe Sharp Entertainment, part of Sony, also recently moved to WGA. However, unfortunately, most of these companies (including a number of other Sony-owned production companies), are not yet unionized and will even employ underhanded tactics to avoid unionization calls, especially in the practice of calling “writer” producers and story makers. While it’s true that a huge amount of writing also goes into the documentary post-production process, especially in a series, there is quite a bit of writing work that goes into prior to filming.
“People involved in making those documents could absolutely be members of current unions, many of the crew may already be unions. Some documentarians like blockbusters like Barbara Koppel and Ken Burns are in the DGA. The DGA Awards have a documentary category. They don’t give awards to anyone who isn’t a DGA member, so even just a review of who’s nominated in that category will show you who DGA is. … The fact of the matter is that union benefits are expensive but it is totally doable.
